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Njspotlight.com ‘Teacher Contract Negotiations: Lean Times and Hard Bargains’
Press of Atlantic City ‘Group that gave New Jersey a D+ for handling teachers praises reform efforts’
Press of Atlantic City ‘New Jersey school districts reluctant to use federal grant money’
Njspotlight.com ‘Teacher Contract Negotiations: Lean Times and Hard Bargains’
Press of Atlantic City ‘Group that gave New Jersey a D+ for handling teachers praises reform efforts’
Press of Atlantic City ‘New Jersey school districts reluctant to use federal grant money’
Njspotlight.com ‘Teacher Contract Negotiations: Lean Times and Hard Bargains’
State School Boards Association reports new contracts at historic lows, salary increases averaging below 2 percent
By John Mooney, January 31 in Education |Post a Comment
As New Jersey’s school leaders begin drafting budgets for next year, lean economic times are continuing to play out at in the one place that matters most: the contract bargaining table.
The state’s School Boards Association said that new teachers' contracts continue to come in at historic lows, with contract settlements in the last quarter of 2010 averaging below 2 percent in salary increases.
In the first quarter of 2010, they averaged well over 3 percent.
In the meantime, a number of other developments are evident, with concessions showing up in healthcare and length of school day and year, the association said.
And while a non-negotiable item, teacher layoffs are also not far from many negotiators’ minds as new deals are struck. State law prevents the two sides from bargaining over layoffs, but lawyers said both sides are aware that the settlements could decide whether teachers stay or go.
"In this negotiation year, we are really talking about jobs,” said Philip Stern, a Newark attorney who has negotiated on behalf of school boards for nearly 20 years.
The comments came out of a conference held in Trenton on Saturday to help local districts and municipalities cope with the uncertainty of next year’s state funding and devise plans for meeting new caps on local property taxes.
Titled “Collaborating on Real Solutions to the 2% Cap,” the conference hosted by the School Boards Association and the state League of Municipalities drew nearly 200 school and municipal board members and administrators.
Much of the presentations focused on different ways of sharing services across agencies and borders, as pressure mounts on cutting tax dollars. But presenters and others said the toughest decisions with schools will likely rest in the one area that makes up as much as 70 percent to 80 percent of budgets, teacher and other personnel contracts.
And coming off a year where there were an estimated 3,000 school jobs lost and a new year with not much relief expected, the school board officials and lawyers said it has been a bargaining climate like never before.
"I think the state of the unions can be summed up in one word: shock," said Robert Greitz," a labor relations specialist for the School Boards Association. "They have never seen what they have now."
"It’s an unbelievable change from even just two years ago," he said.
That has led to concessions in all areas of contracts, with the association saying four out of five new contracts include union concessions in health insurance, work time or compensation.
Salaries continued to creep up, however, with the average starting pay for this year nearing $50,000, at $47,746. Next year, the average for a first year teacher with a bachelors degree will be $48,445, the association said.
Press of Atlantic City ‘Group that gave New Jersey a D+ for handling teachers praises reform efforts’
Posted: Sunday, January 30, 2011 7:31 pm | Updated: 7:33 pm, Sun Jan 30, 2011.
Group that gave New Jersey a D+ for handling teachers praises reform efforts By DIANE D'AMICO Education Writer pressofAtlanticCity.com | 0 comments
A year after giving New Jersey a D+ for how it manages the teaching profession, the National Council on Teacher Quality says the state is one of the most aggressive in proposing reforms to the education and evaluation of teachers.
But the state's largest teachers union said student results show the state does not deserve the poor grade for its current policies.
"The proposals that are being talked about (in New Jersey) are the highest on our critical action list," said Sandi Jacobs, vice president of the council. On Thursday, the group released a "Blueprint for Change" update to its 2009 grades.
The New Jersey Education Association said the grade is not about teaching but about setting a political agenda.
"It's a publicity stunt to push their agenda," NJEA spokesman Steve Baker said. "Our students are consistently among the highest-performing in the nation, so how can our teachers be so bad? I don't think most people are buying into this message."
The council lists eight critical attention areas for the state:
n Ensure that teacher evaluations assess effectiveness in the classroom using objective evidence that includes but is not limited to test scores
n Connect tenure decisions to teacher effectiveness and extend the probationary period to five years from three
n Prevent ineffective teachers from remaining in the classroom indefinitely by making poor performance grounds for dismissal
n Require that all elementary school teachers know the science of reading and math and prove it through testing prior to certification
n Raise the passing score on the Praxis test teachers must take for certification and require separate passing scores for each subject area
n Provide flexibility in how alternate route teachers can show content knowledge through a test-out option for course work
n Expand alternate route providers so that school districts and nonprofits can offer the programs, rather than just colleges
Other recommendations in the report include requiring aspiring teachers to take an exam to qualify for entry into teacher education programs, something some colleges already do but is not required by the state. It also recommends some pension reforms and requiring more subject matter knowledge for special education teachers, especially those who work with students expected to learn grade-level content.
Baker said some of the issues raised in the report are worth discussing, but to grade the state's entire teaching profession as barely passable is insulting to the teachers.
"They just picked a grade that suited their agenda," he said.
Acting state Education Commissioner Christopher Cerf was more tactful, saying the state does have areas that need improvement.
"There is no question that New Jersey is one of the best states based on the aggregate, and there is no question that is because it has talented, hard-working and effective teachers," he said in a phone interview. "We are very proud of that."
But he added that the large achievement gaps that exist for low-income and minority students show there is room for improvement. He said the reasons for the gap go beyond just teaching, but good teachers can play a major role in closing it.
"I am convinced the gap can be narrowed," he said. "Even in low-income districts, there are schools that are doing well."
Jacobs said the goal of the council is not to bash teachers but to improve teaching.
"There are great teachers out there, but we really don't know who they are," because the current system does not help identify them, she said.
Jacobs cited Colorado, Rhode Island and Delaware as states that have made the strongest efforts to change teaching through measures such as merit pay. She said those states started by making changes in regulations, then got the Legislature on board to pass laws. She said the federal Race to the Top funding also has pushed more states to change. New Jersey lost out on those funds but is still being aggressive in connecting teacher performance with tenure and dismissal.
Gov. Chris Christie has appointed a task force to make recommendations on how to evaluate teachers. Their recommendations are due in March. He also has called for the elimination of tenure.
In 2010, the state Department of Education required all public school districts to post on their websites the process they use to evaluate teachers and principals, and what percentage of educators at each school received a satisfactory evaluation. A review by The Press of Atlantic City of local school district procedures found almost every teacher had been rated satisfatory. Almost all of the state's teachers also have met the licensing criteria to be called "Highly Qualified" as required by the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
Cerf said that while New Jersey may be performing well nationally, the nation is falling behind internationally.
"We can go from good to great," he said.
Contact Diane D'Amico:
609-272-7241
Press of Atlantic City ‘New Jersey school districts reluctant to use federal grant money’
Posted: Sunday, January 30, 2011 10:52 pm
New Jersey school districts reluctant to use federal grant money By MEIR RINDE The Times of Trenton pressofAtlanticCity.com | 0 comments
TRENTON — Trenton and other cash-strapped school districts are sitting on millions of dollars of federal money, but they have been reluctant to spend it ahead of possible announcements of more state aid cuts by Gov. Chris Christie.
Trenton, for example, learned in September that it had been awarded $7.5 million under federal legislation targeted at saving education jobs. Having laid off 218 employees during the summer, the district doubtlessly could use the funds.
Four months later, however, interim Superintendent Raymond Broach has not spent a cent of the money. Nor have most of the New Jersey districts that were awarded a combined $262 million, state Department of Education data show.
Statewide, districts had only applied for $1.9 million in reimbursement from the award money as of December, the DOE said.
Trenton’s state fiscal monitor, Mark Cowell, said that after the money was awarded, he advised district officials to hold off on spending the funds because Christie might soon announce new reductions in school funding, as he did last year.
The district might need the money to soften the blow in the new fiscal year that starts July 1, officials said.
“We are waiting to see what happens with next year’s state aid payments,” said district Business Administrator Jayne Howard, who is crafting the fiscal 2011-12 budget.
Cowell, the monitor assigned to help Trenton improve its financial management, said the district may have to lay off more employees this year depending on how its fiscal picture shapes up.
The federal education jobs money was awarded to schools across the country. Mercer County received $12 million, with awards ranging from $88,036 for the county vocational schools and $96,663 for Robbinsville, to $2.5 million for Hamilton and $7.5 million for Trenton.
While Trenton’s award was by far the largest, as a poor district funded almost entirely by the state, it also stands to lose the most. By contrast, the county’s suburban districts could end up benefiting from changes in the 2011-12 state budget that Christie is expected to release next month.
Speaking earlier this week in Chesilhurst, Camden County, the governor criticized the court-ordered funding formula that pays for school operations in a small number of districts, including Trenton, calling it a “failed experiment.”
“The state’s funding formula has been rigged so nearly 60 percent of all the state aid goes to 31 school districts,” he told residents attending a town hall meeting. “It’s crazy.”
Christie said his administration would seek to change the formula again, less than three years after former Gov. Jon S. Corzine succeeded in changing it in ways that led to a long-term funding freeze for Trenton and other poor districts.
With contractual salary and benefit costs, utility costs and other expenses rising annually, the funding freeze has effectively cut Trenton’s funding every year, district officials said, leading to annual mass layoffs of teachers and other staff.
Christie also further cut aid to most school districts last year as he balanced the state budget. The state Supreme Court heard arguments this month from advocates for poor districts who say the cuts violated the state’s constitutional obligations.
An Associated Press Member Exchange story.
